The wonderment of all interests under the sun and beyond.

Ian Anderson/Homo Erraticus (history through the eyes of a pied piper)

In as much as history either repeats itself, or retreats into a maddened hiding place from the humans who made it so, there is a refuge for its logic. Ian Anderson, the pied piper for Jethro Tull, has taken the time to most definitively explain the propagation of historical (or sometimes hysterical) events with music and delicately chosen lyrics. Jethro Tull has often been accused of Celtic overtones buried within their music, but the truth is that they are the Elizabethan kings of the British frontier. Ian, however has delved into a journey that has become a rather fascinating one. His solo career has ingeniously (and selectively) travailed with specific directions on each of his efforts. Some of them instrumental, some with light techno, some with additional bricks from a lingering past, and notwithstanding his most recent, Homo Erraticus. We have here a most daring slide of hand into dreamscapes of historical significance, prophetic stories of old, and a reckoning yet to come. The ever present flautist pines along with sweet and semi-maniacal songs of six pence telling us daunting tales of revelation to be. The lyrics are parabelistic in nature, sometimes obscure, but if you know Ian as I do, the words live within themselves and rise into a story of their own creation. The instrumentation is dynamic, You simply cannot escape the fiery guitar work and on “Doggerland”, and the cleverly “brickish” keyboard work as well. There are numerous varieties of musical endeavors available as usual, giving us a full table to feast upon. Give a listen to “After These Wars” and hear the undertones taking the place of the overtones mentioned earlier. A truly ambitiously brickless album, for this one holds the stones of years.